A View from Above

As a professional basketball player for 13 years before he retired in 1974, the seven-foot-tall Chamberlain towered over the sport both literally and figuratively; among his many records is the almost incredible scoring of 100 points in a single game. Because of certain factors, however--his demands for high salaries, his interracial dating--several sportswriters cast him as a villain. In 1973 he wrote Wilt , largely about his career as a cager, and here, concentrating more on Wilt the person, he presents a notable book. He comments on the public's rudeness to tall people, touches on his bookishness (which he has kept secret from reporters), puts in good words for women in sports and presents his political views as a Republican who admires Nixon, Ford and Thatcher, but not Reagan and Bush. Chamberlain also gives details of his prodigious sexual appetite, the number of his bed partners having passed 20,000 and still climbing. Photos not seen by PW. (Nov.)